Think of it as Conversations
The question of which conversation to join makes sense as a way of thinking about how to specialize on this Ph.D. path. Five or ten years from now, what conversations do I want to be a part of? What kinds of things do I want to know about?
Thinking back over the last five years, I’ve learned about a lot of things that are useful, but been a part of many conversations that held only some interest for me. Now, back in school, I have the opportunity to forge a path that is really about my own passions and interests. The basic problem I’m interested in studying is integration in countries receiving immigrants. I’m interested in how government handles this at multiple levels (EU, country, region, city). I’m also interested in the dynamics of social interaction, language change, and how they play out at the school level.
The following conversations interest me greatly:
- Immigration policies aimed at integration, and the role of education in that.
- Policy making, implementation, and evaluation, especially policies related to immigration and language issues in schools (e.g., bilingual schooling, language acquisition, foreign language teaching).
- Research methods, designing studies.
- Theories of assimilation, social change over time, histories of social change.
- Language, immigration, diversity as governance issues.
- What else? Topics or issues from my master’s?
I know for sure I’m not interested in instructional policy, pedagogy (i.e. how to teach…don’t feel I know enough from teaching myself). I don’t want to write curriculum. I can see myself teaching at the university level, or running a study abroad program with research projects on the side. Or simply working for a research organization. Or working for the government. Or perhaps heading the research division for a foundation or education NGO.
While I don’t feel 100% certain of whether the interests I have now will lead me down these paths, I do feel like I’m ready to commit to a research direction. This is exciting. So much of grad school for the last two years has been about waffling uncertainty. I’m ready for a committed focus!